Musicians streaming and dreaming
Local artists are finding a following through online plays. Now to make the most of it
When high school buddies Greg Lemon and Aaron Lang started rocking out in a crammed Pickering garage, they never dreamed they’d be lined up next to Adele and Coldplay.
But in the digital space, a band that’s never even played a show can effortlessly rack up tens of thousands — sometimes millions — of views with a few clicks.
In the past week, the suitably named Lemonlang’s debut alt-rock album Self Implode Deadline has moved to second spot of the top charts on Rdio, a digital music subscription service, with over 50,000 plays and climbing. “I’m not exactly sure how it happened but it’s been kind of an interesting week watching it happen,” said Lemon. “The Internet’s a powerful tool.” When Lemon, 33, and Lang, 30, formed the band over two years ago, playing music was a hobby for the Pickering natives — something to do after a full day’s work in the automotive and aircraft industries and, in Lang’s case, raising two kids.
After recording and editing the album between their two homes, Lemon said he signed up for the $50 Reverbnation distribution package, which assists art- ists in getting their music played on various subscription services and sold online on itunes and Amazon.
It could easily be lost amid Rdio’s 15 million songs — including the latest top 40 hits — available for streaming. “I told a lot of people I know to play it,” Lemon said — them and the eight people who subscribe to the band’s Facebook page and fans on a Soundgarden fan site.
Lemon, who played music long before being a Youtube sensation was a route to superstardom, seemed genuinely shocked the album was doing so well, sharing the latest numbers with followers. “It was a bit of a fluke,” he said.
“I’m not exactly sure how it happened but it’s been kind of an interesting week.” GREG LEMON WATCHING HIS ALBUM RISE ON RDIO’S CHART
But Marisol Segal, executive director of content and marketing for Rdio, said their site is actually designed for bands like Lemonlang to get noticed. “It’s definitely not a fluke,” Segal said. “Every day on Rdio, I find albums by artists I’ve never heard of.”
Local artists like folk rock singer Ryan Van Sickle, who grew up in Dundas, Ont., are also trying to reach out to potential fans through online means. One method is to stage simple concerts — “Now you’re your own producer,” he said — and share them live through Google’s social-media site, Google Plus. (Specifically, its Hangouts video-chat service.)
He said he’s seen increased album sales since starting to play online; he’s also started offering to book live house shows, to drawing on his online fans. “Doors have been opened, so it’s been great,” he said.
But for Van Sickle, playing online is the jumping-off point to the kind of “real world” success every artist dreams of. “I’m actually hoping that I can build a large enough fan base that I can go on the road and play venues and bring in a crowd.”
Van Sickle’s plan would see him follow in the path of Connecticut-based Daria Musk. When she pressed the start button on Hangouts for the first time last year, her music was instantly delivered all over the world, though Hangout’s normal limit is 10 people participating at one time.
“All around the world, you move me,” she sang as part of a seven-hour concert. All around the world, they applauded.
With the help of the Google team to open up the event, her second concert had an audience of 9,000 in 100 countries. Her third was watched by more than 200,000 people, more than 10 times the seating capacity at the Air Canada Centre.
Musk said putting her music online in an interactive way has led to in-person concert gigs in venues she was never able to fill before, and even landed her a music video shot by an L.A. producer who she met in a Hangout.
“One of my favourite parts about it is how effortlessly global it is,” she said.
How big an audience an artist finds is hard to predict. Though Rdio doesn’t publicly release subscription numbers, U.S. competitor Spotify, one of the biggest subscription services, reportedly has 10 million active users worldwide.
Segal says trending albums grow organically amongst users’ networks of friends. Albums getting lots of plays will show up in your network’s “heavy rotation” and a lot of plays in a short period will get the album trending.
“This is really one of those great examples of how the social discovery aspect can work,” Segal said. “If the record is something that people like, then it’s going to pick up steam.”
Most of Lemonlang’s listeners are based in Ontario and all of them are from Canada, Segal said. Many are new users of Rdio and it’s not clear if the album’s trending success is translating into album sales or further opportunities yet.
Rdio pays royalties per stream, but would not reveal their price scheme. Comparable services pay a fraction of a penny per play online — a sore point for some artists. (The Black Keys, for example, have kept their music off such streaming services, and drummer Patrick Carney stated, “If it was fair to the artist we would be involved in it.”)
But the path to fame (if not fortune) for local bands is transforming nevertheless. For Walk Off The Earth (the once-unheard-of Burlington band whose five-members-one- guitar video garnered more than 80 million views on Youtube) Internet fame yielded a spot on Ellen and a major-label record deal.
“It is every person’s dream to get to do what they love for a living,” said band member Sarah Blackwood in an email. “Because of the recognition we are receiving, we will have the chance to tour a lot more, make more records, songs, videos etc. So this has given us the freedom to do more of what we had already been doing, and on a bigger scale.”
But Blackwood said just because one video can launch your career, doesn’t mean you don’t have to work to stay relevant.
“You still have to put your blood and sweat into your craft,” she said.
As the publicist for Canadian acts like City & Colour and The Sheepdogs and now Walk Off The Earth, Cristina Fernandes said viral fandom helps get bands in the spotlight fast — but can end just as quickly: “If an artist doesn’t have the chops to back it up, I feel their success is short-lived. There is definitely a threshold to the success a band can achieve on their own in the music industry.”
But if you’re still below that threshold, even a modest boost is felt. Google Canada spokesperson Aaron Brindle said Hangouts change the game for a small-time musician without much cash. “What you need to go on tour or to find a venue that’s willing to take you on . . . is so beyond what any kind of musician starting up could ever hope for. But what this technology does (is) level the playing field.”
Lemon agrees new technologies have at least helped him be heard. “I thought one day the Internet would be useful.” But for now, Lemonlang’s still working and waiting for someone to call, or at least fans to comment.
“We’re wondering what can actually happen now,” he said. “There’s something brewin’.”